


Attention

by musiwrites



Category: The Mist (TV)
Genre: F/M, Fix-It, Half-Sibling Incest, Underage is two underage characters together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-30
Updated: 2017-08-30
Packaged: 2018-12-21 16:22:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11948034
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/musiwrites/pseuds/musiwrites
Summary: She looks at Jay, Jay who rescued her again and again despite everything, and she knows he’s good.





	Attention

**Author's Note:**

> This series was a hot mess. Also, I like commas too much, sorry. Unbeta'd (in case it's not obvious).

Alex isn’t sure where she finds the strength to rip herself out of her mother’s grasp, but she does. She looks at Jay, Jay who rescued her again and again despite everything, and she knows he’s good. Knows someone was wrong, he can’t be guilty.

She looks at him, tendrils of thick mist curling around and into his body, blank eyes, and she knows. She knows what it’s like to feel your mind fill with terrors as the life is ripped out of your body. 

Somewhere, in all that she knows, she finds the strength to reach him before he’s gone. Her mother runs after her and together they haul him back to the car, she pulls him into the back with her and holds him close. He’s breathing heavy and she shakes with relief, doesn’t let him go for fear that if she can’t feel every breath he’s taking he may stop breathing completely. 

Irrational, maybe, but at this point what can it really hurt, she figures. There’s already more than enough to worry about, for now she just holds him close and takes comfort in the fact that he’s here, warm and breathing.

*

“It wasn’t him.”

Her father tells her something she already knew. Connor cries, holds his son close. He apologizes, and Jay accepts, but it will never be the same. They all know that, very little will ever be the same between any one of them ever again. But they’re here. They’ve all survived this far and that’s what counts, right now. 

“Who told you I was dead?” Her father says, rhetorical and dark. She’d loved Adrian, and she doesn’t cry, but she wants to. Unsure whether it’s from relief or sorrow, she’s barely been able to parse what she’s felt for days, now. Too much going on, too much loss, too much new information. Just too much.

*

They drive as far from the railway as they can, as soon as the train begins to leave, not wanting to risk being attacked for their vehicle. Once upon a time she knows she would have felt wrong, leaving them all behind without even trying to help, but there’s no way. There aren’t enough resources, no space to take them in, they can only protect themselves. 

* 

Once they reach the next town over, they make a plan. 

First thing’s first. Food, gas, shelter. Those are their priorities. 

They hit a supermarket and she and Jay are given strict instructions not to leave the car. It’s hard, impossible, even, to let her dad out of her sight again when it hasn’t even been an hour since she believed he was dead, but she doesn’t have the energy to fight, anymore. Besides, Jay is too hurt to fight, and she can’t leave him alone, so she stays. Her mother, father, and Vic head inside for supplies while Mia and Connor work on siphoning the gas from surrounding cars and keeping watch. 

It’s the first time she’s been alone with Jay since they went skating, and she has so much to tell him.

“I’m sorry.” She starts, it feels empty, like it’s not enough, but she hopes he can at least see how much she means it. “I’m so sorry, Jay. I should have believed you, you only ever tried to help me. I just didn’t know-”

“Hey.” He interrupts, using his good hand to pull hers from where she’s balled them in her lap, wringing them tight. “No. I- you didn’t know. Something horrible happened to you, and you didn’t know.” The sincerity in his words, after everything she brought down on him, is enough to bring tears back to her eyes.

“Jay. I can’t believe I did this do you. I can’t-” This time she’s interrupted by her own choked off sob, Jay tries to sooth her but she continues, not even sure what she wants to say, anymore, but the words won’t stop. “It was Adrian. I thought I could trust him, I thought I could trust him.” He pulls her close and she stops trying to speak, letting out quiet tears and stuttering breaths. 

“This isn’t your fault.” He says, quiet but vehement as he cradles her close with his good arm. “No one saw it. No one could have known what he was.” It’s true, she supposes. No one had known, maybe his father but somehow it still feels wrong to think that. Whatever was wrong with Adrian, she wants to blame him. Maybe it came from him, or from what he did to Adrian and his mom, she doesn’t know.

Still, she knew him best. She should have known, should have seen it but she didn’t. She doesn’t say any of that to Jay, though. Maybe one day, when all this is over, if it ever ends at all. If they survive. For now, she just wraps her arms around him in return, and does her best to take his words for the forgiveness they are. 

*

Eventually everyone returns, unscathed, for once, and it’s no small mercy. Her mother eyes the way her and Jay are curled together, and it’s not with the malice of before, but it’s for good reason, still. She knows that, but it’s a worry for another time. 

*

They hole up in a modest home on the outskirts of town. Just out of the way enough that it’s unlikely anyone is going to come across them, but not so out of the way it’s impossible to get back to town if something goes wrong with the car and they need to escape. 

The first night, they eat together, and everyone tapers off quickly afterwards. Retreating to lick their wounds. Jay and his father disappear into one of the rooms upstairs, and she goes into the other with her parents. Curls between them in the bed like she used to when she was small and allows herself to feel almost safe again. She falls asleep to the sounds of Vic and Mia tinkering around downstairs, too restless to sleep, and the warmth of her family.

*

The next day feels a lot like waiting for the other shoe to drop. 

They spend the day trying to come up with plans on what to do next. Her parents and Mia both want to keep moving. They’re convinced that if they travel far enough there has to be an end to it. Vic and Connor aren’t so certain. They want to stay in the relative safety of their house here as long as they can. 

She points out that eventually their supplies will run dry. They can’t be the only survivors here, it’s not a large town, and the shelves and tanks will be emptied before long. 

Jay is the one who mentions that they might not like whatever they find where the mist does end, if it ends. Someone knows something, as is evidence from the train, and maybe whoever knows what’s going on won’t be too keen on letting them leave.

They argue, and it all feels like an easy way out. Something to escape the feeling lingering over all of them, the anticipation for whatever will come to hurt them next. 

Eventually they settle on staying a week or so. Just long enough for everyone to rest, heal up a bit, get stronger and build up some stock of food and gas to take on the road, not knowing what they’ll find the next town over. They still haven’t reached a resolution about what they’ll do when they find whatever’s waiting for them at the end of the fog, but the certainty that sooner or later they’ll run out of provisions keeps them moving regardless. 

*

Her parents are asleep, Connor and Mia in the guestrooms, Vic on the couch, and she knows Jay is still up, sitting in the kitchen. She knows she never heard him make his way up the stairs. 

Just as she’s making her way to the door, her mother stops her. She whirls around, ready for an argument, but her mother doesn’t look like she’s about to tell her off, so she stays silent.

“I love you.” She says. “You know about everything now, so please, just be careful.” There’s a plead in her voice, and although she’s still angry sometimes, when she thinks too much about it, Alex knows her mother did everything she did to protect her. Out of love. She nods quietly and hugs her mother before turning back to the door and going out into the hall. 

*

She finds Jay at the kitchen table, clumsily trying to change the dressings on his burned hand. 

“Hey.” She greets him with a small smile, pulling out the chair next to him and gently pulling his injured hand to her, unwinding the old dressings far more deftly than he’d been managing. 

“Thanks” He answers her with a smile of her own. So bright, even after everything. “Couldn’t sleep?” Alex shrugs. She’d just wanted to talk to him, and when she tells him as much he informs her that she’d better not be there to apologize again. She isn’t sure how to feel about that, but she appreciates the sentiment so she smiles and shrugs it off again. 

“No, it’s not that.” His face falls at the serious undercurrent in her voice, and he scoots closer. She works on applying the antiseptic wipes to his hand to distract herself from what she has to say, concentrating so hard she can’t help a small jump when he jerks and hisses in pain.

“Shit, sorry.” She says, trying to be gentler, though there’s no way it won’t sting. He grins, pained. “I thought I said no more apologizing?” She lets out a small laugh and finishes with the wipe, switching to the much more bearable burn cream.

“So?” He asks after a moment. “What is it?” 

She bites her lip, pausing to grab fresh gauze and begin wrapping it around his hand.

“My mom…” She begins, unsure how to continue. “My mom told me something, told everyone something, yesterday at the mall. Just before they threw us out.” Jay doesn’t speak when she looks up, nervous, just nods for her to go on, brows drawn together in… something she can’t quite place. 

“She told me- everyone, my dad isn’t my biological father. It’s…” She trails off, finishing up his hand and finally forcing herself to give her full focus to him. Searching for some kind of reaction, some kind of comprehension, but his expression hasn’t changed at all. “It’s Connor. It’s your dad. He’s my biological father.” 

“I know.”

For a long moment, neither of them speak, but eventually he continues. 

“My dad told me, last night. He told me… a lot of things. I don’t know, it’s his way of trying to fix things, I guess.” She nods. Not really sure what to say, now that it’s out there. They both know, this is fact, but what does it change? She isn’t really sure. She stares down at the faded, floral print of the tablecloth until she feels Jay’s hand surround hers, gripping hard. 

“Are you alright?”

She sighs. “You’re my brother.” She explains, trying to put all that confuses her about that into her tone. He nods, gaze dropping as he deflates slightly. She feels his hand begin to loosen and instinctively grips it tighter with her own, unwilling to let him go.

“You don’t feel like my brother.” 

He holds her gaze for one long, suffocating beat before leaning forward, crowding close to her until they’re sharing breath and she can feel the heat of his skin against her cheeks. He hesitates there, in that space, too close and not close enough. It’s her that closes the distance between them. Pushes closer. His arms come around her, firm, but gentle. Their kisses are anything but, building fast in intensity, almost hard enough to hurt. 

Eventually he pulls away, leaning his forehead against her as she twists her fists tight into the back of his shirt. 

“Please,” She begs. “Please don’t tell me we can’t do this.” He huffs out a desperate laugh, at that, pulling her closer so she straddles his lap, kissing her again, hard and chaste. 

“No. Fuck, no. I know this isn’t right, but I don’t care. I just want you.” He breathes. “After all this shit, what’s one more thing, right?” He holds her face in his hands and smiles, she leans up and laughs into a kiss. “Right.” She agrees. “What’s one more thing?”

**Author's Note:**

> I hope this isn't too messy, but I wrote it through a migraine and it went direct to posting so hopes are dim. Find me @musiwrites on twitter and please, join this garbage fandom with me.


End file.
